A coalition of nine Southeast Michigan community colleges including Washtenaw Community College is working with industry partners to fill an envisioned shortage of skilled workers in advanced manufacturing and alternative energy.

The Southeast Michigan Community College Consortium plans to unveil a new Web site, www.michiganskillstoday.org, by the end of April, said Al Lecz, regional director. The site will allow local companies and job seekers to search through products and services offered by the schools and to learn of skills and projected manufacturing job openings in various industries.

The consortium is using a three-year, $2.1 million grant from the U.S. Labor Department to build curriculum capacity and purchase equipment. A second requirement of the funding involves training 500 unemployed workers or new hires and 1,000 incumbent employees, Lecz said.

A February report by the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research found that "there will be considerable hiring in the U.S. and Michigan automotive industries and total U.S. automaker employment will not decrease" through 2016. Changes in the industry mean many of the new manufacturing jobs will become more "technologically advanced," the report said.

The consortium held the first of five planned seminars with industry participants April 10 at Schoolcraft College in Livonia and will likely hold a future seminar at WCC, Lecz said.

"We want industry to be driving what we're doing and validating it," said Lecz, adding that individual colleges such as OCC use feedback from companies to adjust their curriculum. "That's never done. So that's going to be an ongoing thing as things move."

The jobs-training program opens the consortium to any companies working in advanced manufacturing or alternative energy, and it benefits companies by allowing the member schools to partner together to offer more complete areas of expertise, Lecz said.

"Another feature of this grant is Washtenaw's unique role," he said. "Washtenaw is developing advanced manufacturing and innovation, the methods for being innovative."

The school has worked to develop its innovation education with an industry consultant for incorporation into the curriculum at the other consortium members, Lecz said.
"Innovation education, we're finding it doesn't matter where you apply it, it's the way you think and the way you apply it to the consumer that's the value of the training," he said.

Wind and solar startups are showing plenty of interest in tapping manufacturing know-how in Michigan, but matching companies with existing competencies can be difficult, said Michael Gaudaen, a consultant for renewable energy startups who lives in Monroe.

"It's an ideal situation," Gaudaen said. "The only thing I would like to see in addition is I think (the schools) are in an ideal place to be a custodian of a profile of what kind of competencies exist, because they live in the communities."